PRINCETON — The eyes of the college lacrosse world were on Princeton Stadium Saturday as the Tigers hosted the eighth-ranked Syracuse Orange.

Unfortunately for coach Chris Bates and company, the result didn’t match the stage.

In front of an announced crowd of 4,610 and a national television audience on ESPNU, Princeton couldn’t top its historic rival, losing 13-12 in a back-and-forth affair. After falling into an early 3-0 hole, the Tigers — ranked seventh by Inside Lacrosse and tied for eighth in the USILA Coaches poll — battled back to take a 9-7 lead heading into the fourth before ultimately falling short.

“I didn’t think we left anything on the field, but at the end of the day we need more plays and we needed more poise to find a way to win the game,” Bates said. “Their bus ride home is a happy one and ours isn’t, so to speak.”

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The goal that put Syracuse up for good came with 2:32 left to play. The Orange’s JoJo Marasco took a defender’s stick to the face, but was somehow able to play through the contact and score to put Syracuse up by the winning margin.

“JoJo has a nose for the goal,” Bates said. “(Defender) Alex (Beatty) played him well for 12 seconds but on the 13 second he just kept going to the cage.”

Early in the contest, the Orange were able to jump out to a quick lead, scoring the game’s first three goals.

“We came out slow and they came out fast,” said Princeton’s Tom Schreiber, who finished with a goal and two assists. “They seized the moment when it counted and we didn’t.”

After that early flourish, however, the field definitely seemed to tilt in the Tigers favor. Henry Schoonmaker scored the Orange’s third goal at the 6:07 mark of the first quarter, but from that moment until the end of the third, Princeton was largely able to control the game, outscoring Syracuse 9-4 over that 36-minute stretch.

“We were just executing our system, and we weren’t making many mistakes on the defensive end,” Schreiber said.

Things began to unravel in the fourth. The Princeton defense — which had been stout throughout — suddenly looked more porous than it had all game long. The Orange scored six goals in the final frame, nearly half of its total.

“I think we wore down a little bit,” Bates said frankly. “Our depth hurt us. I thought we got tired.”

Still, the Tigers’ footing looked solid. After surrendering two quick goals to Derek Maltz, Chris White and Jeff Froccaro were able to score for Princeton, giving the Tigers’ a 12-10 lead with less than seven minutes to play.

“We scored 12 goals against a good defense, so at the end of the day I thought the offense did some good things,” Bates said.

Syracuse, however, proceeded to score the last three goals of the game — a run punctuated by Marasco’s winner.

“In the fourth quarter we let it slip, and they took advantage,” Schreiber said.

Froccaro led the Tigers with four goals, while Mike MacDonald added three. Schoonmaker had four goals and two assists for the Orange.

While the loss certainly stings, Princeton will need to have a short memory. The Tigers control their own destiny in the Ivy League, and have two big matchups this week. On Tuesday they’ll travel north to Piscataway for a nonconference tilt against Rutgers, and Saturday they’ll head to Hanover, N.H., for an Ivy showdown against Dartmouth.

“Everything is in front of us,” Bates said. “This one is disappointing and it hurt because its Syracuse, and that it went down how it went down, but we have a big week ahead of us. These are two games that we have to have a businessman’s approach and take care of business. I want to be sitting here a week from now with two wins under our belt.”